Draupadi

CHAPTER XXV (edited)

"You will freeze if you remain this way. You must not dear. You must move."

 -Rainer Maria Rilke

 Letter to Sidhonie Nadherna 

 1st August 1913 

 --------------------------------------- 

 I locked myself in my chamber. I sat down on the floor, dropping my limbs gently and sitting without a sound. My limbs folded gently, like a dying bird folding into itself. 

 I then pressed the side of my head that was not bruised and lay on the floor, using my arm as a makeshift pillow. I curled into myself and then it started. 

 My sobs, both of physical and emotional pain.

 I hurt all over. Skin. Bone. Breath. Thought. 

 The clarity that had earlier settled itself in me was now gone, leaving a cave of emptiness from where it once resided. My rage, my fury everything was missing. Lost. Scattered. Torn apart.

 I touched the bruise on the side of my cheek and my hip bone. Just the slight feather touch made me burn all over. My scalp screamed. The smallest movements made the world spin. 

 My sobs intensified. 

 I wanted to die.

 I really wanted to die. 

 I wanted to forget everything. I wanted to disinherit myself. 

 My sobs wracked my body once again. Tears turning to sobs. Sobs turning to wails. Wails turning to low painful moans. Moans turning to convulsions. 

 I cried myself to exhaustion and yet the tears fell.

 Why me? Why this sorrow that no woman should have? What sin did I ever commit? Why was I not enough for the men I love to protect me when I needed it most? 

 Krishna. 

 This time the words escaped not in prayer nor warmth. But in pleading. Like blood seeping from a wound. 

 "Draupadi" a voice called suddenly. Krishna had entered. I didn't raise my head to see him. I didn't have to. I knew he was there. 

 Krishna never arrives the way men do; he appears, like light through a crack.

 I tried to raise from the floor, failing miserably but then Krishna gathered me from the floor, so lightly, so tenderly and held me in his arms like a mother would hold her child. 

 "Sakhi" he said, his voice so Krishna it seemed to go beyond my skin, my thought, my heart. 

 I cried in his arms silently and then loudly. 

 "I thought I was going to die." I said silently. He drew a breath sharply. 

He didn't answer immediately, instead he ran his palm over my hair, gently soothingly. "But you did not." he whispered solemnly. 

 "They dragged me by my hair Krishna. My hair. They threw me into the Sabha. Talked of my chastity. Tried to disrobe me. No one- not even a single person spoke a word. Not even a single word. They all watched Krishna." 

 I removed myself from his arms and sat next to him, head propped against wall. "That felt worse than death." I said and sobbed again. He did not speak until my sobbing stopped.

 His eyes endless as oceans, filled with galaxies and thoughts no mortal could comprehend met mine. 

""You are right, Sakhi. It was worse than death. Death ends pain. But humiliation—" he paused, eyes flickering with an ache that felt ancient, "—humiliation lingers. It eats from the inside. It turns the living into ghosts."

"Then why me?" I asked leaning my head against his shoulder. 

"Fire and fate Draupadi. There is no simple answer to the questions you ask Draupadi, fire does not test. It reveals. You are not their victim — you are their mirror. Through you, every man in that court saw what he truly was."

He sighed. I looked at him. 

"You could've come sooner." I accused. 

"If I had you fury would have never taken form. The world would have never know your strength. You would've never realised that you in yourself are divine."

He took his hand in mine. "The wives of those who have angered you will weep like this. They will see the dead bodies lying on the ground, bereft of life. Their bodies will be covered with Bibhatsu's arrows and will be drenched with blood. Do not sorrow. I will do whatever the Pandavas can do. I will make you a promise. You will be the queen of kings. The heavens may fall, the Himalayas may be rent asunder, the earth may splinter and the ocean may dry up. O Krishna! But my words will not be falsified. I promise." 

The words filled me with a certain warmth. "I promise." he repeated. 

"Now in exile you will strengthen yourself. You will heal. You will rise. You will make the heavens shake when you return." 

"Krishna, will you always be with me?"

"Always. Forever. Till the day our souls meet." 

I smiled shakily. "Promise?"

He took my hand in his once again. "Promise."

---------------------------------------------------------------

This chapter is super sweet and emotional! Please read vote and comment.